Lives Lost: At veterans’ home, towering legacies of the dead

Each of their stories was different, but common strains repeat: Of humility and generosity; of finding joy in the unpretentious; of a sharp mind disappearing into fog or a hale body betrayed by age. And, of service, in war or in peace, that often went unspoken when they returned home. In their final years, these veterans found their place at the Holyoke Soldiers’ Home in Massachusetts. And in their final days, as the coronavirus engulfed the…